Islamabad: Former Pakistan premier Benazir Bhutto's son Bilawal, whom she was grooming to step into her shoes, is a black belt in Taekwondo but regrets that he could not play cricket.

Bilawal, who uses his mother's surname, also likes swimming, horse riding, squash and target shooting.

The 19-year-old, currently studying in Oxford, told a local daily in a rare interview three years ago that he will always regret the fact that he could not play cricket because of the "circumstances in which my family had been put".

Bilawal, who was three months old when his mother first became prime minister, spent his childhood in Dubai and London when his mother went into self-imposed exile.

Bhutto always fiercely guarded her children's privacy and kept them away from the prying eyes of the media. Bilawal, the eldest of Bhutto's children, who chose to study at his mother and grandfather's alma mater after finishing his O levels in Dubai, was inconsolable at Bhutto's funeral on Friday.

Bhutto's son, who turned 19 in September, said he knew about the family's legacy and that he had "powerful role models who will obviously influence my career choices when I am older".

On his joining politics, he had said, "We will see, I don't know. I would like to help the people of Pakistan, so I will decide when I finish my studies."
      
"I can either enter politics, or I can enter another career that would benefit the people," Bilawal said when he was 15.

Like his mother, whom he doted on, Bilawal spoke about Pakistan's problems which he said could be solved if there is democracy in the country.

Source : PTI